Post Reply 
Do you find some mathematical activities useless?
04-05-2018, 04:51 AM (This post was last modified: 04-05-2018 04:52 AM by Joe Horn.)
Post: #27
RE: Do you find some mathematical activities useless?
(04-01-2018 12:29 PM)Maximilian Hohmann Wrote:  I know that mathematics is useful, to a degree at least. But I see no beauty in it.

Thank goodness that "beauty" means different things to different people. To me, "e^(i*pi)=-1" is a striking example of beauty in mathematics. My mind is just as aesthetically thrilled by thinking about that equation as my eyes are aesthetically thrilled by gazing upon the beauty of nature's best surprises, such as double rainbows, the Northern Lights, or the Grand Canyon. Something about the combination of surprise and symmetry makes my heart skip a beat... which is what all Great Beauty, of any kind, does to me. Ditto for great architecture, great poetry, great music, great meteor showers, great human physiques, and those glorious snippets of mathematics which I, at least, find immensely beautiful.

Yes, maybe Euclid alone has looked on Beauty bare, but she needn't be naked to be beautiful. Even the mere sound of her massive sandal set on stone, heard but once and then but far away, is beautiful. (Thanks, Edna!)

<0|ΙΈ|0>
-Joe-
Visit this user's website Find all posts by this user
Quote this message in a reply
Post Reply 


Messages In This Thread
RE: Do you find some mathematical activities useless? - Joe Horn - 04-05-2018 04:51 AM



User(s) browsing this thread: 2 Guest(s)